Dear Santa: My Knees Hurt

I buy cheap shoes. I always have. In fact, I've always been a little smug about people who shell out big bucks for shoes, because I couldn't imagine it was really worth it.

It's easy to have ideals when your knee joints are, you know, 22 years old.

But then your knee (and hip and ankle) joints start the downhill slide toward 40. Suddenly climbing the stairs generates more popping than Orville Redenbacher, and you start to wonder if those quality-shoe people were on to something to begin with.

Let's just say I'm reconsidering my smug cheap-shoe buying.

My husband has some KEEN shoes (these, in fact), and he swears they are all kinds of crazy comfortable. My noisy knees and I suddenly have our sights set on these:

They're clogs. And Mary Janes. Two of my favorite features in a shoe. They also have a "metatomical footbed for personalized comfort". I have no idea what that means. But I think my knees would like it.

Just in time for Christmas, the KEEN people have offered to give one lucky reader any pair of shoes from their website, absolutely free. Your pick. For real.

To enter to win, all you have to do is visit their site, browse around the KEEN site, come back here, and leave a comment saying which pair you think you'd pick.

Oh, and it's not a requirement, but if you want to, tell me your shoe-shopping philosophy. Are super-frugal, or do you think that's one item worth paying up for?

I'll close down the comments on Tuesday morning, 12/16, and I'll draw a random winner then. You must have a valid U.S. mailing address to win.

Comments

I buy cheap shoes. I always have. In fact, I've always been a little smug about people who shell out big bucks for shoes, because I couldn't imagine it was really worth it.

It's easy to have ideals when your knee joints are, you know, 22 years old.

But then your knee (and hip and ankle) joints start the downhill slide toward 40. Suddenly climbing the stairs generates more popping than Orville Redenbacher, and you start to wonder if those quality-shoe people were on to something to begin with.

Let's just say I'm reconsidering my smug cheap-shoe buying.

My husband has some KEEN shoes (these, in fact), and he swears they are all kinds of crazy comfortable. My noisy knees and I suddenly have our sights set on these:

They're clogs. And Mary Janes. Two of my favorite features in a shoe. They also have a "metatomical footbed for personalized comfort". I have no idea what that means. But I think my knees would like it.

Just in time for Christmas, the KEEN people have offered to give one lucky reader any pair of shoes from their website, absolutely free. Your pick. For real.

To enter to win, all you have to do is visit their site, browse around the KEEN site, come back here, and leave a comment saying which pair you think you'd pick.

Oh, and it's not a requirement, but if you want to, tell me your shoe-shopping philosophy. Are super-frugal, or do you think that's one item worth paying up for?

I'll close down the comments on Tuesday morning, 12/16, and I'll draw a random winner then. You must have a valid U.S. mailing address to win.